


Look at the Stars, Kid

by HBossWrites



Series: Surviving Project Freelancer [2]
Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: BLARGH, Between season 5 and 6, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, It's really more the implication that those things exist than anything actually happening, Parent Tucker, Stargazing, honk, implied racism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-06
Updated: 2018-03-06
Packaged: 2019-03-27 22:44:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,754
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13890696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HBossWrites/pseuds/HBossWrites
Summary: “You gonna tell me why I’m here? I still haven’t figured that part out.”“Lavernius Tucker, you were stationed at Blood Gulch, is that correct? During your stay there, you were in contact with a Sangheili solder.”“Crunchbite? Yeah, that fucker knocked me up, knocked me out, and got himself killed. Couldn’t have happened to a nicer prick.”Or: Tucker and Junior are reunited on a space station and Tucker is not losing his kid again.





	Look at the Stars, Kid

**Author's Note:**

> This takes place between seasons 5 and 6 of Red vs Blue. Only canon knowledge is required to understand the content.
> 
> There is no actual child abuse directly addressed, only the potential for there to have been child abuse, and no racist slurs are used, only the reference to potential racist attitudes.

Tucker had just enough time to surrender his armor, change, and stuff his duffle bag under the pathetic excuse for a cot in the coat closet of a room he’d been stuffed in, before he was ordered right back out of it by some over greased asshole wearing too many fucking badges on his non-combatant uniform.

The asshole had a sneer a mile long and spent the entire time he looked at Tucker with his nose up in the air like his shit didn’t stink. The guy looked like ten pounds of asshole in a five-pound bag, and sure, Tucker was used to dealing with assholes, but there was something about this particular brand that never sat well with him. Those guys who walked around, thinking they were better than everybody else, who didn’t care who they stepped on, on their way up the ladder. Who took one look at someone and fucking _judged_ like it was their place.

He had no idea what the fuck the asshole’s deal was, but he was ready to punch him in the fucking head if he didn’t stop looking at Tucker like he was something he’d scraped off his shoe.

“Come with me, now.”

Tucker crossed his arms, but followed the dick. He’d been brought to the space station for a reason, and Tucker was curious what anyone would want with a private from fucking Blood Gulch.

He’d tucked his sword into his pocket before he left the room. Tucker wasn’t stupid, he knew they knew he was carrying something, but no one asked him what it was and no one told him to take it out, so he wasn’t too worried. He didn’t think anyone actually believed him about his glowing sword of destiny anyway, so there wasn’t a whole lot to worry about.

“You gonna tell me why I’m here? I still haven’t figured that part out.”

The greasy motherfucker stared at a datapad as he walked, didn’t so much as look at Tucker as he talked to him.

“Lavernius Tucker, you were stationed at Blood Gulch, is that correct?”

“Yeah, it fucking is. What’s that got to do with anything?”

“During your stay there, you were in contact with a Sangheili solder.”

“Crunchbite? Yeah, that fucker knocked me up, knocked me out, and got himself killed. Couldn’t have happened to a nicer prick.”

“Yeah, don’t say things like that here, the Sangheili Ambassadors don’t like that. Just speak with respect when you’re addressed and keep quiet unless someone directly talks to you.”

Tucker snorted.

“I don’t know what the fuck you think I’m gonna do to help your cause. I don’t exactly want anything to do with these guys, peace treaty or not.”

“Then you’ll just have to keep your fat mouth shut until we’re done. DO NOT piss off the diplomats or it’ll be _your_ head on a pike, do you get me?”

Greasetrap punched a code into a keypad next to a fancy as shit door. It slid open and Tucker clapped his hands over his ears at the sudden, high pitched attack on his eardrums.

Someone was screaming.

It was shrill and piercing and endless, like a violin being tortured by a tenth grader with something to prove, barely stopping for what had to be gulps of breath before it started again. It sounded raw, like the screaming had been going on for a while.

He felt sick just listening to it.

Ass Face must have seen something on Tucker’s face, because the sneer ramped up a notch.

“Don’t faint. It only stops when it passes out.”

The room was filled with a colorful mix of aliens and humans, mingled together with expressions of exhaustion and frustration. They all looked about as stuck up and pompous as the grease factory, but with a lot nicer uniforms, so Tucker couldn’t blame them too hard.

The screaming was like nothing Tucker’d ever heard outside of his nightmares.

God! He needed to make it stop! It was like knives in brain trying to scrape their way out through his skull! What the fuck was wrong with these people that they could just stand there and not feel anything?!

Greaseball turned to the nearest human and snorted, not a breath of sympathy in him.

“No one’s managed to make it stop yet, huh?”

Something in Tucker’s brain snapped.

He shoved past his escort, past the aliens and humans who were armed to the teeth, and into a cleared space where one alien wearing some extra elaborate getup was standing holding a squirming, squealing bundle of-

“JUNIOR!”

“HONK-HONK!”

Tucker snatched his kid out of the alien’s arms and pulled him in for a hug, the little guy screamed at an even higher pitch and dug his claws into Tucker’s chest. He wailed for a moment before he quieted and just started making these pitiful little honking noises, and Tucker’s whole body fucking melted.

The room stopped to stare as the painful screaming turned into the soft sobs of an exhausted child.

Tucker honestly had no idea what he was doing, or how he was even sure that this was his kid and not some other alien grub some poor shmoe’d been forced to birth like a xenomorph baby. The little guy rubbed his eyes and blinked up at Tucker.

No, it was Junior. Junior. His Junior. His fucking kid. How did that even happen? Where did they find him? _How_ did they find him?

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?!”

The greasy asshole grabbed at Tucker’s arm, nearly smacked Junior as he tried to pull Tucker backwards. He managed to swing himself away from the fucker and crouched under the swinging arms of the alien who’d been holding Junior in the first place.

“Back off, asshole!”

Tucker grabbed his sword and swiped it at anyone who got too close. The aliens all stumbled back, but the humans were fucking pissed and started pulling guns.

Tucker bolted for the door.

He expected to get shot, and yeah there were all kinds of crazy noises and crashing sounds and screams coming from the room, but so far he hadn’t gotten hit.

They made it into the hall and Tucker fucking booked it! He had no idea how he was supposed to get them off the ship without being found immediately, but there was no way he was going to stay there, not when Junior was so scared and alone and thin.

_Fuck_ was he thin.

He hadn’t been that small when he was fucking _born_.

Tucker stumbled at the sound of sirens overhead and nearly face planted on the floor. Junior squealed and sunk his teeth into Tucker’s neck.

“SON OF A BITCH!”

Junior screamed as Tucker’s blood poured into his mouth, but didn’t let go.

“OUCH! That hurts!”                                                                                                              

The little guy let up on the teeth, but kept his jaw firmly latched onto Tucker’s shoulder blade and growled. He clearly wasn’t happy about getting jostled. Hell, Tucker wasn’t happy about it either, but he didn’t go around biting people who pissed him off!

He made it back to the tiny space they’d claimed was his room and shut the door as quick as he could. He could hear the stomps and shouting of the soldiers chasing him, and part of him hoped they thought there was no way he’d hide in his room and they’d just run right past.

The rest of him knew better, but he didn’t exactly have a whole lot of options. He had no idea how to fly a ship, and there was no way he’d be able to convince someone to take them before he was caught and Junior was dragged out of his fucking arms.

The only option left was to find a spot he could defend and fight.

Tucker knew from experience that these doors weren’t designed to lock in place by force, and a code from the head of the ship would be all it took for those assholes to get inside. He also knew, thanks to Simmons and his insane amounts of anxiety and need to be left alone sometimes, that doors like this usually had a way of locking the person in with an interior bar in the door. If he could get inside the shell of the door and break it with the bar locked in place, he could buy himself a few minutes to negotiate.

He shifted Junior onto his left hip and activated his sword again, thankful that it turned itself off when he nearly tripped, since he didn’t enjoy the idea of cutting his own head off. How embarrassing would that be?

Tucker sliced off the door panel and found the internal mechanisms that pulled the door open and closed it. There were a bunch of wires and blinking lights and metal rods that Tucker only barely understood where they might go. Mechanics were not his strong suit unless they were the mechanics of love.

“Don’t suppose you know which one of these to break if we want the door to stay shut, huh?”

“Blargh, honk.”

Junior pointed to a thick bar in the center of the door and motioned down and to the right. Tucker looked at it.

“Is that a brace? Awesome! You are so fucking smart!”

Tucker shoved the bar down and pulled it. It slid into a hole in the wall and clicked, pretty effectively trapping them in the room for the time being. Tucker busted the gear that helped it move for good measure and grinned.

“That’ll buy us some time to negotiate, I hope.”

No one was taking his fucking kid from him again.

Tucker snatched his blanket off the cot, wrapped it around the both of them, and curled up on the pathetic excuse for a bed he’d been given. He could feel the goddamned frame bite his ass through the mattress and cringed.

Still, it was quiet. No screaming, no gunshots. Maybe they got lucky.

“I’ve got you, Junior.”

He rocked Junior back and forth a little, like he remembered his mom doing, and hummed under his breath. Junior let go of Tucker’s shoulder and burrowed his tiny face into Tucker’s chest. His kid, his boy, his tiny boy was in his arms again and needed him, and Tucker could hardly breathe.

Tucker smiled, eyes watery, and playfully plucked at the weirdo clothes they’d shoved Junior into. Poor kid looked like he was swimming in it.

“That is the ugliest onesie I’ve ever seen anyone wear, kiddo. You let them dress you like that?”

“Blaaargh.”

God, what the fuck was happening?

Tucker wasn’t the parenting type, he wasn’t _capable_ of taking care of a child. He hated kids, and babies, and especially hated taking care of kids and babies.

Well, ok, he didn’t hate them, but he sure as fuck didn’t know how to make them not hate him.

But this was his kid.

This was _his_ kid.

And he’d been screaming.

Junior blurbled against him and flexed his claws in Tucker’s shirt. The man could feel the pinpricks scrape his skin and did everything he could not to wince. Junior didn’t need the extra stress.

“Yeah, they’re gonna come soon, but I’m hoping those aliens you were with are smarter than the humans and they’ll back the fuck off. They’re not gonna take you away from me again. I’m not afraid to cut a motherfucker in half.”

And he would, too. He would _absolutely_ cut a bitch in half if that meant he’d get to keep his kid. Keep him safe.

Fuck, what was _wrong_ with him?

Tucker heard the door try to open from the outside. It squeaked unhappily and didn’t budge. The bar they’d broken held firm.

“Nice job, bud.”

Junior honked, upset and scared, and curled in on himself in Tucker’s arms. Tucker pulled the blanket over Junior’s head and rocked a little harder.

“Hey, hey, shh, it’s ok. I’ve got you.”

Tucker heard the speaker next to the door crackle.

**_“Lavernius Tucker, what in the_ hell _do you think you’re doing?! You have just kidnapped the Sangheili’s sacred religious icon!”_**

Greasy guy snarled on the other end and Tucker held up a middle finger to the speaker. He had no idea if they had cameras in the room or not, but he was pretty damned hopeful that they did, if only for him to piss the cheesedick off.

Tucker reached for the control panel on the wall (and you know it’s a shit room when you can touch both walls with your hands at the same time) and pressed down on the talk button.

“I didn’t kidnap anyone! This is my fucking kid! _My_ kid! You assholes kidnapped _him_ from _me_!”

There was quiet on the other end. Tucker didn’t fucking care what they thought; he was not giving Junior back.

**_“You cannot keep that youngling in there. The ambassadors are becoming agitated and they_ will _break the door down and take it back.”_**

“Over my dead body, they will! Tell them to back off, and you back off, and _maybe_ I’ll talk to you.”

Junior made a distressed whine and bit down on Tucker’s pec, the closest fatty tissue to his mouth at the moment.

“Ow! Fuck, little dude! Why do it?!”

**_“What’s happening?!”_ **

“He’s pissed off and scared and fucking hungry! Have these assholes been feeding him?!”

**_“It has refused sustenance for an extended period of time. The elders think it’s fasting.”_ **

How the fuck does anyone think a _baby_ is fasting? Jesus, it was a miracle Junior hadn’t _died._ Even Tucker knew you didn’t limit a baby’s food supply! They had bodies that were growing crazy fast, and it was not ok to starve them!

“You’d better not be calling my son an ‘it’, you asshole. You’d best straighten out how you talk about him or I’ll cut you up and I’ll sleep good after.”

**_“Look, just open the door so we can talk.”_ **

“Not until I know my kid is gonna be safe!”

**_“How do you even know it’s yours?!”_ **

“He fucking looks like me!”

**_“It does not!”_ **

“I will beat you down, so hard, if you don’t stop calling him an it! You don’t even know! Get me the guy in charge!”

**_“I am the guy in charge!”_ **

“Then get me your boss on a screen! You think this is a joke?! My kid’s been screaming himself sick and he’s so skinny I want to throw up, you will not fuck around! Get me someone who isn’t a complete asshat or I’m gonna start feeding Junior whatever the fuck snack cakes Simmons managed to steal from Grif and hide in my suitcase! Do you think the Sangheili are pissed now?! Wait until I get Junior hooked on Twinkies!”

Junior made an ugly honk at the door, pushed his arm out from under the blanket, and held up his middle finger.

“That’s right, little man! You tell that fucker.”

**_“It just did something inappropriate didn’t it?”_ **

“You gonna stop calling my kid an it?”

**_“They don’t have the same gender system that we do!”_ **

“Do _they_ call their kids ‘it’?”

**_“Jesus, just give him back before the ambassadors get here and start tearing through the walls!”_ **

Tucker didn’t respond. He shut off the control panel and gave Junior a squeeze.

“I’ve got this. You just stay calm.”

“Blargh. Blargh-honk.”

“Still not entirely sure on what that one means, but...I’m sorry, Junior. I really am. I didn’t want them to take you, and I tried, I really did, but I’m a class A fuckup. Jesus, I didn’t even ask if you wanted to go with me. Maybe I should open the door, you’d get taken care of out there, I don’t even know what the fuck I’m doing.”

Junior screamed and sunk his teeth into Tucker’s shoulder.

“FUCKING OW! Don’t do that!”

“Honkhonkhonk! Blargh-blargh!”

“Ok, ok, I get it. You don’t want to go back with them. I hear you. I hear you, buddy.”

Junior made a pitiful burble and chewed gently on Tucker’s shirt.

He was impressed that someone with teeth as sharp as what Junior had in his head could chew on fabric and not tear through it instantly. The little bastard had teeth like razorblades and some pretty impressive control over them.

Tucker ran his hand over Junior’s scales, following the flow and occasionally stopping to scratch gently at a sensitive spot. There were some places where his scales were damaged, and Tucker didn’t know if that was general kid clumsiness or if he needed to choke a bitch.

There was time for that part later. For now, Tucker needed a goddamned plan.

“Shh, it’s ok, kiddo, I’ve got you.”

“Blargh.”

“Yeah, it’s been a shitty day, huh? I bet you’re hungry, probably tired too.”

Tucker reached under his cot for his duffle and unwrapped a chocolate snack cake.

“Here you go, courtesy of Dexter Grif. Do you remember him? He was the fat orange one with the bangin’ hot sister in yellow. She was…not so good at babysitting.”

Junior made a pitiful sound and snatched the cake from Tucker’s hands. Little guy didn’t hesitate to shove it in his mouth, and Tucker might have worried about feeding the alien grub human food, except he’d lived off of human blood and hostess products on Blood Gulch, so it was probably fine until they could find him something better for him to eat.

What were kids supposed to eat anyway?

“Honk! Honk-honk!”

“Good, right? Yeah, we’re just gonna hang out in here for a while, just until we figure out what’s gonna happen.”

“Blargh?”

“Hey, relax, I’ve got this. You and me, we’re gonna get out of this and we’re gonna go somewhere where it’s pretty and there’s lots of sexy ladies around to tell you how cute you are while I get their numbers.”

“Blargh Chicka Honk Honk.”

“Fuck yeah, little dude!”

Tucker slipped Junior more snack foods until he didn’t want to eat anymore, and hummed to him when he started to get antsy. He’d sing if his voice didn’t sound so fucking wrecked at the moment. No one banged on the door, no one made demands over the speakers, no one fucked with their lights.

And the adrenaline poured out of them both.

Junior and Tucker both passed out at some point. There wasn’t a whole lot to keep their attention in the broom closet sized space.

Tucker didn’t know when or how or why he fell asleep, just that he and Junior both jumped and panicked at the sound of the door groaning.

Someone was forcing it open.

Tucker tried to put Junior down, to get him onto the bed behind Tucker and out of the line of fire, but the little guy wouldn’t budge. He dug his claws into Tucker’s shirt and growled.

So, Tucker stood up, still with the goddamned blanket around his shoulders like a weird, sideways cloak, and pulled out his sword.

The door squealed as it was pulled off it’s tracks, and Tucker winced at the sound.

Tucker expected the asshole from earlier, but instead there was a black guy with a gentle expression on his face with a fuckton of the aliens behind him holding all kinds of weapons that Tucker was _not_ equipped to be shot by. The guy planted himself firmly in the doorway and smiled.

Well, he did say he wanted to speak with someone higher up on the food chain.

Tucker scooted back and held Junior tighter, and the man nodded gently.

“Please remain calm, Lavernius. We are not here to take your child from you.”

“What do you want, then?”

“We are having a…different translator sent onto the ship, since the current one has proven to be…ineffective and offensive. In the meantime, we would like the two of you to come to a different section of the ship. The Ambassador Team is…rather anxious about their religious icon being kept in this…room.”

The man looked around the closet and wrinkled his nose.

“It is a little…sparse.”

“Yeah, well I didn’t exactly pick it. I’m not coming out until I’m sure they’re not touching Junior.”

The guy nodded slowly, and fuck if there wasn’t something about him that made Tucker feel all kinds of uncomfortable. Like, he looked as non-threatening as a guy could be, but Tucker didn’t believe it for a second. No one walked around with that kind of face in the real world unless they were selling something.

And if they weren’t telling you what they were selling?

Yeah, no. Back away from the kids slowly, and stay away with your creepy white van.

“That is a valid concern for you, I understand. Would you please activate your sword, Lavernius?”

“Why?”

“So the Ambassador’s Protective Detail will allow you to leave. They are quite upset, as you can see.”

And yeah, the aliens were _pissed_. They kept shuffling around and jostling each other and trying to push forward and get in. It was only the human guy standing in the way that kept them from just taking Junior away, that was pretty clear.

Better to cooperate for now.

Tucker shrugged and turned on the sword and all of the aliens backed up like he was holding a snake or something and started blarging back and forth to each other really loudly. Junior let go of his death grip on Tucker’s shirt to poke his head out from the blankets and they all dropped to one knee, including the human.

Junior honked at them, angry as fuck, and made a weird hissing noise that Tucker’d never heard him make before. It sounded like a curse word.

“Whoa, hey, no need for name-calling, bud!”

Junior hid himself in the blankets again and grumbled unhappily into Tucker’s chest. He shifted Junior up a little bit, the kid might have lost weight, but Tucker wasn’t used to carting around anything out of armor. Geez, he needed some time in an actual weight room or he was gonna get saggy.

The aliens all stood and parted, so Tucker put the sword away. No sense in accidentally cutting someone’s arm off. He only wanted to do that on purpose.

The human moved to the side and motioned Tucker out the door, all grace and poise and shit. Tucker narrowed his eyes at the man. There was something really off about him. Like, he was familiar, but Tucker couldn’t remember from where.

As soon as they were in the hall, the aliens surrounded Tucker and Junior, weapons at the ready, but they were all pointed away from him. He was a little freaked by it all, no lie, the last time he’d had close contact with one of these fuckers he’d ended up pregnant and sliced open. Still, he wasn’t gonna fight them on being all protective and shit.

The aliens were trying to defend Junior, and by extension Tucker, from anyone who might come after him. Tucker could appreciate a person who cared about his kid.

They marched Tucker down halls and corridors with a mix of a bunch of different languages written on the walls in plain, bright text, that Tucker couldn’t read until they ended up in front of some wickedly elaborate doors covered in glowing symbols that made Tucker ten different shades of nervous.

“This is Junior’s suite. We have had all of his…staff removed at the moment while the two of you bond and…reconnect. Someone will be with you shortly to translate for you. There is a tray of age appropriate food for him on the table. Please see if you can get him to eat. We are all…concerned for his health.”

“I got him to eat a while ago.”

“Yes, your threatened ‘Twinkies’. Lets try something more…species appropriate?”

Tucker snorted.

“Whatever, man.”

The room was really nice, way nicer than Tucker expected based on his own dinky room. It had banners (tapestries and shit, what was a kid gonna do with a tapestry other than shred it?) and paintings on the walls with bright colors and soft looking furniture and a big open wall with a window out into the depths of space. It was a fucking beautiful view.

Tucker grinned and ran right up to it.

“Oh wow, hey! Look at the stars, kid!”

Junior poked his head out from under the blankets to look and let out a frustrated wail.

Tucker shifted his grip on Junior and poked his head under the blankets to get a good look at the little guy.

“Shh, shh, hey, what’s wrong?”

“Yes, he…does that. As far as we can tell, he doesn’t like being in space. We believe it has…something to do with when he was originally abducted.”

“Shit.”

The guy handed Tucker a first aid kit, fuck, Tucker didn’t even realize his shoulder was still bleeding from the bite.

Tucker walked over to the window and plonked himself onto the ground in front of it. He took a moment to just stare at the view, take in the inky darkness and the thousands of pinpricks of light. Junior started making some distressed noises and buried his face into Tucker’s armpit. He didn’t bite (thank fuck because that would hurt so _fucking_ badly), but he did claw gently at Tucker’s side.

No wonder the kid was fucking stressed out if he had to stare out at something he hated all the time. Tucker got enough of that shit in Blood Gulch. He got it.

Tucker rubbed his son’s tiny back and felt the knobs of his spine under his fingers.

“You know, I was willing to _die_ for the chance to see the stars when I was your size.”

Junior stopped snuffling.

“I lived in the city, big place, not so great, you’ll hear all about that shit later, especially if you have to listen to assholes who don’t know dick about me. They’ll tell you how your daddy’s a hood rat, he’s garbage, he’ll never be nothin’ and never was, because that’s how some people think when they see a guy like me. Can’t have a black guy who’s a good person unless he went to Harvard or some bullshit. You gotta be pretty and eloquent as fuck if you want them to take you serious. That’s not me. I always just wanted to get out of the city, go somewhere that got dark enough to see the stars.”

Junior poked his head out from the blankets and purred quietly. Tucker looked down and smiled wide at the bright and shiny eyes that looked fucking _exactly_ like his. How anyone could question if this little guy was Tucker’s, he had no idea.

“There you are. When they shipped us off the first time and we were able to see, really see the stars outside the window of the ship, I cried. I wasn’t the only one, either. Lots of us city boys lookin’ for a way to be different, be better, do better. The military wasn’t all it was cracked up to be, I fucking hate being in it, but the huge ass perk is getting to be somewhere I can see the sky. When we were done doing our shit in basic, we could sit outside, and fuck if I didn’t go out every night as soon as it was getting dark and watch those motherfucking stars shine.”

Tucker scratched under Junior’s chin and chuckled when Junior tossed his head and nipped at his finger like a cat. He couldn’t complain about it.

His kid was fucking adorable.

The guy, who Tucker was gonna have to get the name of at some point, put a tray down with some stuff that Tucker assumed was ‘species appropriate’ food for Junior.

Yeah, Tucker got why the kid wasn’t interested.

Junior shifted around and latched onto Tucker’s arm with his whole body and sighed.

Then the little guy turned and looked out the window.

This was right.

Tucker pulled Junior a little tighter against his chest and pointed out with his free hand.

“See that? That big old bright one? What do you think that’s called?”

“Blargh?”

“Hey, could be! You never know! I’m calling that one Blargh anyway. How about that one? That really tiny one off by itself?”

“Honk?”

“Yeah? That one look like a honk to you? Ok, so that’s honk. How about that one?”

**Author's Note:**

> I honestly love Junior, and I love the idea of Tucker getting to be a dad to Junior, and I LOVE the idea of Tucker getting his kid back and bonding and figuring out how to do all that ambassador bullshit when he's just some guy! He's just some guy who picked up a neat sword! 
> 
> And I may have plans for this piece to show up at some point in my future stories, so I'm laying the mental groundwork, as it were, to get myself there.


End file.
